Search This Blog

Hot Topics

Friday, January 9, 2015

Ever since I was diagnosed (I'm 22 and diagnosed about 6 or 7 months ago) I've learned a lot about myself and about ADHD. I have started doing a lot of reflection and deeper thinking about what is going on. I want to be able to understand what is happening and why my brain does things differently. One of the most important things I learned while working with kids is to really take a look at what their doing and why they are having the reaction they are having. For a while I was working with students who every morning had to practice handwriting by copying their name over and over. At first I was thinking 'this is easy, why don't they just do it' and then one day it hit me right in the face that this was the most boring, unexciting, non challenging work ever! And I thought about myself, and my mom had shared with me that when I was in first grade she told my teacher that I hated doing the spelling homework because it was boring, and I saw myself in those kids and felt so much more connected. I think that for parents of ADHD children taking a moment to really look at what is being asked of the child, whether it's everyday things, chores, homework or anything else. I know sometimes patience has become thin but if even one time you were able to see through there eyes it might make a great difference!

Tuesday, January 6, 2015

I’m 45 and just this year (2014) I found out what has been a major road block for me that has in many ways held me back for my entire life. I never knew what it was but I knew something was different in the way I functioned. I could never explain what was going on other than I felt shut down most of the time. I knew what I wanted in life but I could never seem to obtain it. I was doing ok, but I knew I could do much better.

I was always bouncing from one thing to another, I found it very difficult to do tedious things, I couldn’t stay focused on a task long enough to do it effectively and often couldn’t do it at all. I would get bored quickly and because of that I went through many different jobs. I never got fired, just bored to a point that I would just quit and move on to something else.

Sleep was something that was very difficult for me. I would usually stay up until 1-2am and then have to deal with being so tired the next day. I just couldn’t seem to turn off my brain at night and most of the time I would just sit and watch TV in an attempt to drown out the never ending activity in my head. It was exhausting! Yet I still couldn’t sleep. I won’t even go into how I was just mean and irritated all the time.

There’s more to the story but I think you get the idea.

I have WHAT!

So one day I’m on the phone with a friend that I had just met the year before, we were talking about this and that and a project we were thinking of working on together and I must have been going off on a tangent because he stopped me in the middle of a sentence and said, “Mike, have you ever thought that you might have ADHD?” I said “What?” and immediately thought “Is he talking about that excuse that parents use when they can’t get their kid to behave?” but what I said to him was “No, why?” He responded by asking me several questions to which I mostly responded yes, he then said that he thought I was probably ADHD and that I should see a Doctor. What! Are you kidding me? How would you even know if I had ADHD, I thought. So, I asked him and as it turns out he was diagnosed as an adult with ADHD. We talked more about it and what it “looked” like and I decided to go ahead and check it out.

Sure enough, after the doc tested me his response was “Wow, I’m impressed”, as in you have really high scores and you really have it in a big way. Oh no! Now what?, I thought and then the conversation went to what medicine to start with and how much to take and what to expect and what to do after that and etc, etc, etc…. So I picked up my first prescription of Adderall from the pharmacy on the way home and I was off.

There's gotta be a better way...

I didn’t like it…. It was expensive, especially the extended release formula and I didn’t like the way it made me feel. I ended up with the regular type because of the cost so I had to remember to take it twice a day and if I took it too late I couldn’t sleep (so problem not solved in that category) and I just didn’t like the idea of putting man made chemicals in my body every day, twice a day.

A good friend.

Anyway, in an effort to keep a long story short (too late, right) I’ll get to the point. About two months later I told another friend of mine about my diagnosis and she told me to stop by because she had something she wanted to give me. I stopped by that day and she told how her daughter had just kind of dropped out of life and had turned into a sulky person who didn’t want to leave her room and was missing school and friends and life basically. I was intrigued because I had days like that sometimes. She also told me about a friend of hers that was a wife and mother who had been diagnosed with several things including ADHD and was on several different meds but she still wasn’t functioning like she wanted to. She wouldn’t leave her house, hadn’t done laundry in a long time and just wasn’t able to be a mom to her kids or a good wife to her husband. Ok, these weren’t exactly the same as what I was dealing with but parts of each of their stories sounded similar to mine. She told me that both of them had been taking something new from QSciences called EmpowerPlus Q96 and that both of them were greatly improved and both were functioning like they should and back to living life.

She helped me understand that many issues can be helped by getting proper nutrients through the blood brain barrier and to the brain. The brain is obviously the most important part of us and if we aren’t able to take care of it properly it isn’t going to function properly. Meds are designed to help our bodies do something that, for whatever reason, it isn’t doing properly, so I figured that if there was a way to get whatever my brain needed into my body in the right way then I wanted to know more. I’m not going to try to explain how it all works here but I’ll give you some links below.

I'll never be without it again.

All I knew is, I wanted to try whatever they were doing and I’m really glad I did. I notice a difference in my daily life and the daily lives of my family. I am able to focus better, stay on task better, I am sleeping very well and even dreaming now, which tells me I’m getting a deep REM sleep and I can’t remember a period of sleeping deeply enough to have really good dreams. I’m calmer during the day now too.

The big clincher for me though and the reason I will probably never be without this product again is the reaction from my family. I know that living with me has not been easy for my wife and four kids and it pains me to know what they have gone through while having me as a part of their daily lives. They like me much more now and want to actually spend time in the same room with me.

I did stop taking the product for a time because I wanted to try something else and they could definitely tell that I had stopped taking it. I also noticed that things got more tense in our relationships and that they were starting to spend more time in other parts of the house, away from me. I’m back to taking care of myself and we are all better off.

Now what

I most likely sent you this to you after we chatted either in person or online, or you may have spoken with my wife. You may see some similarities between my story and your own but either way I encourage you to dig a little deeper into the links and gather some information for yourself so you can decide if you want to give it a try. I will say this, I have seen people use it and I have heard good results from them. I have experienced good results myself and I believe that this is the way for me to live a more “normal” life and be in a much better place for myself and my family without pumping medication into my body.

I am more than willing to answer questions and offer any guidance that I can to help you. Just keep in touch by emailing me here. I’m glad you took the time to read about my experience and I truly hope it’s been helpful.

About Me

Our ADHD Story is a place where people can share their stories, thoughts, and feelings about ADHD. Get past the generic list of symptoms and see how it is affecting people in real life through personal stories. We are not here to inform you, we are here to engage you.